Campaign for north state senate seat heating up early

Not a single radio ad has aired and the usual rash of campaign signs has yet to appear on north state lawns for the candidates running for the District 4 state Senate Republican primary this June.

Agribusiness (includes timber): $206,225.

Individuals: $56,620.

Construction/real estate: $38,825.

Insurance/finance/banking: $34,059.

Vice (gambling/alcohol/tobacco): $25,550.

Politicians' PACs: $24,400.

Misc. businesses: $19,800.

Health: $18,648.

Transportation: $17,550.

Other/undetermined: $17,350.

Energy: $12,150.

Lawyers/lobbyists: $8,923.

Communications/electronics: $8,150.

Labor: $6,400.

Water/recyclers/waste disposal: $6,315.

But for the past several years, the two top Northern California candidates, Republicans Doug LaMalfa and Rick Keene, have nonetheless been battling it out behind the scenes.

Their weapon: Campaign donors' cash.

A Record Searchlight analysis of hundreds of online campaign finance filings the candidates reported to the state secretary of state between 2007 and 2009 found that while LaMalfa may have ended 2009 with less money in his campaign war chest overall, more of his cash is coming from donors living inside the district he wants to represent.

About two-thirds of those who donated to LaMalfa's campaign were local.

By comparison, about 60 percent of Keene's donations were from individuals, business and organizations based outside the district.

Two Democratic candidates, Lathe Gill, a lawyer from Crescent City, and Paul Singh of Live Oak have pulled papers to run in the race, but they haven't tallied enough campaign donations to be tracked on the secretary of state's Web site.

The deadline to report campaign filings for last year was Feb. 1.

A competitive race

The race is shaping up to be one of the most competitive primary contests in Northern California, thanks to two strong candidates with similar political affiliations. Keene and LaMalfa are both staunch conservatives with nearly identical political resumes.

LaMalfa, a Richvale rice farmer, is a former assemblyman who represented the north state's 2nd District from 2002 to 2008. Keene, a lawyer from Chico, represented the neighboring 3rd District during the same period.

In the overwhelmingly Republican 4th Senate District, the winner of the primary almost always wins the general election.

The men are vying to replace Sen. Sam Aanestad, R-Grass Valley, who is termed out at the end of this year.

The massive 4th Senate District sprawls from the Pacific Ocean at the Oregon border nearly to Sacramento, encompassing Butte, Colusa, Del Norte, Glenn, Shasta, Siskiyou, Sutter, Tehema, Trinity and Yuba counties. It also includes part of Nevada and Placer counties.

Who's giving?

Health: $91,300.

Agribusiness (includes timber): $74,250.

Construction/real estate: $74,000.

Insurance/finance/banking: $71,750.

Vice (gambling/tobacco/alcohol): $56,800.

Transportation: $53,400.

Individuals: $46,050.

Communications/electronics: $46,000.

Misc. business/retail: $40,000.

Lawyers/lobbyists: $35,600.

Energy: $34,200.

Labor: $22,000.

Politicians' PACs: $15,675.

Water/recyclers/waste disposal: $13,500.

Other/undetermined: $3,800.

Broken down by industry, Keene's top five donors came from the health lobby, agribusiness, the construction and real estate sector, insurers and bankers, and from the "vice sector," made up of gambling interests, tobacco lobbyists and alcohol sellers.

Around half of his out-of-district donors were from political action committees whose lobbyists list Sacramento as their address. The top out-of-area sectors that gave to Keene were health care providers, insurers, bankers and the communications industry.

Half of the donations LaMalfa's campaign reported were from agribusiness, which includes timber interests, and from individual donors.

Construction and real estate, insurers and bankers, and the "vice sector" rounded off LaMalfa's top five donor groups.

LaMalfa also is taking in more cash as the election nears.

He came out ahead last year over Keene, a fact LaMalfa's campaign calls a shift in momentum.

The LaMalfa campaign reported that its candidate had raised $259,304 in 2009, more than double the $109,661 Keene raised over the same period.

Keene does hold a strong overall fundraising advantage, though. He ended 2009 with $1.02 million cash on hand, according to filings posted on the California secretary of state's Web site.

However, about $280,000 of Keene's funds can't be spent on the primary against LaMalfa, since that cash was raised for a past general election race, Keene's campaign manager Cliff Wagner said.

Keene says his fundraising and the sources of that money are exactly what he had hoped for at this point.

Keene and Wagner say Keene's advantage is thanks to transferring some $645,000 from the account used to raise funds while Keene was an assemblymen.

The disproportionate number of out-of-town donors to Keene's campaign reflect his experience as a member of the Assembly's Republican leadership as well as his work on the budget committee and his efforts at reforming workers' compensation, Wagner said.

Keene's financial backers choose him over LaMalfa because "he wasn't engaged in the same level as Rick," Wagner said.

Wagner alleges Keene is ahead of LaMalfa in overall cash because LaMalfa spent lavishly from his campaign stash on Assembly races he was certain to win.

"That's not a conservative approach to doing business," Wagner said.

Keene said he's not concerned that LaMalfa is gaining momentum as the race heats up.

LaMalfa responds

LaMalfa's Sacramento campaign manager, David Gilliard, chuckled when he heard Wagner's snipe at LaMalfa for being fiscally irresponsible in spending his Assembly cash.

LaMalfa's choice to spend money on seemingly easy-to-win races in the Assembly was a wise choice as it gave him the opportunity to advertise and share his message his constituents, who will now return to vote him into the Senate, Gilliard said.

Similarly, he said he's pleased that LaMalfa has garnered so much support from those living inside the district.

LaMalfa said he also thinks the Keene campaign is misleadingly overstating its fundraising lead; since $280,000 of Keene's cash cannot be spent in the primary.

He called it "laughable" that Wagner would criticize him for defending his Assembly seat.

LaMalfa also notes that his competitors spent close to $200,000 in ill-fated efforts to unseat him in the Assembly.

Campaign experts' take

Tony Quinn, co-editor of the "California Target Book," a nonpartisan publication that analyzes congressional and state legislative election campaigns in California, said LaMalfa may have the upper hand, though he has less money to spend overall.

"I think more money from local folks is probably more helpful," Quinn said. "It gives you more of a grass-roots base. The ones that usually win tend to be the ones that have a larger base."

But Matt Ross, a Republican strategist and founder of the Sacramento public relations firm, Ross & Associates, said he'd take the cash, regardless of where it came from.

With more campaign money, a candidate is able to buy more radio, print and television ads and communicate his message to voters.

"That's why it always helps to have more money, plain and simple," Ross said.